‘The ball was just sitting in the grass’: Steve Smith explains why no one was able to settle on the MCG deck | Cricket News
Australia captain Steve Smith said excess grass on the pitch at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) made it difficult to bat during the fourth Ashes Test, which ended in two days as England won by four wickets on Saturday.A total of 36 wickets fell across six sessions, with 20 wickets on the opening day and 16 on the second. England’s victory ended their long wait for a Test victory in Australia.
Smith said the 10mm of grass left on the surface played a key role in how the pitch behaved.“It probably started quite slowly and it’s hard to explain. It’s not normal tennis, it comes from the humidity of the wicket,” Smith said in the post-match press conference.He added that the thickness of the grass affected how the ball behaved after the throw.“I think because of the thickness of the grass. The ball was just laying in the grass, if that makes sense to you. Like I felt in the first innings, a couple almost like chipped in the middle playing a defensive shot that was kind of laying in the grass and it was hard to drive the ball because of the amount of it. The seam was just catching the grass and it was stopping,” he said.Smith said the surface offered too much seam movement, making it difficult for hitters to stabilize.“It was tricky. Nobody could really get in. I think when you see 36 wickets over two days it’s probably too many,” he said.He suggested a slightly shorter layer of grass might have helped.“It probably did a little bit more than they wanted. Maybe if we cut it down to eight millimeters, that would be about right,” Smith said.England captain Ben Stokes also said a Test match ending in two days was “not what you want”, while adding that teams had to deal with the conditions presented.“When you go out there and you’re faced with these conditions, you have to react and deal with them,” Stokes said. “But to be honest, that’s not really what you want.”
